Footballer Kompany’s dad elected first black mayor in Belgium

Pierre Kompany, the father of Manchester City captain and Belgian international defender Vincent, became Belgium’s first black elected mayor on Monday after his party topped the poll in the Brussels suburb Ganshoren.

Pierre Kompany, 71, arrived in Belgium in 1975 as a refugee from what was then Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of Congo, and has since been naturalised as a citizen and entered politics.

He was head of the centrist CDH list in Sunday’s municipal election in Ganshoren, a bilingual French and Dutch speaking town of 25,000 just outside the Belgian capital, and will take office in December.

“He’s the first black mayor in Belgium,” Vincent declared on Instagram. “It has never happened before. It’s historic. We’re all delighted. Bravo to my father.”

In 2014, a local councillor of Congolese origin, Denis Liselele, served as temporary mayor in the Belgian town of Sambreville after the elected town leader was suspended during a court case.